Facts
With four candidates in the field, Lincoln received only 40% of the popular vote and 180 electoral votes which was just enough to win the election. Meaning 60% of the votes were for a candidate besides Lincoln. A few weeks after the election, South Carolina seceded from the Union.
Douglas and Lincoln were neck and neck in mid-point of the race. This wasn't their first head to head though, they first went up against each other in 1858, with a series of debates for re-election for Senate. Lincoln did not win the election for Senate, but this helped him later on. Him running for Senate earned him national recognition which helped him when he ran for president. Unlike the other face off between the two, this time the outcome was different and better for Lincoln.
The key to the Republican party's success was its position on slavery. It opposed the expansion of slavery and called upon Congress to take measures, whenever necessary, to prevent its extension. It condemned slavery as an immoral institution and most Republicans thought that by confining slavery within its present boundaries, that it would become extinct and disappear. The party was, therefore, a genuine anti-slavery party, but most Republicans rejected a more radical stand that would associate them with abolitionism.
Abraham Lincoln is elected the 16th president of the United States over a deeply divided Democratic Party, becoming the first Republican to win the presidency. Lincoln received only 40 percent of the popular vote but handily defeated the three other candidates: Southern Democrat John C. Breckinridge, Constitutional Union candidate John Bell, and Northern Democrat Stephen Douglas, a U.S. senator for Illinois.
Douglas and Lincoln were neck and neck in mid-point of the race. This wasn't their first head to head though, they first went up against each other in 1858, with a series of debates for re-election for Senate. Lincoln did not win the election for Senate, but this helped him later on. Him running for Senate earned him national recognition which helped him when he ran for president. Unlike the other face off between the two, this time the outcome was different and better for Lincoln.
The key to the Republican party's success was its position on slavery. It opposed the expansion of slavery and called upon Congress to take measures, whenever necessary, to prevent its extension. It condemned slavery as an immoral institution and most Republicans thought that by confining slavery within its present boundaries, that it would become extinct and disappear. The party was, therefore, a genuine anti-slavery party, but most Republicans rejected a more radical stand that would associate them with abolitionism.
Abraham Lincoln is elected the 16th president of the United States over a deeply divided Democratic Party, becoming the first Republican to win the presidency. Lincoln received only 40 percent of the popular vote but handily defeated the three other candidates: Southern Democrat John C. Breckinridge, Constitutional Union candidate John Bell, and Northern Democrat Stephen Douglas, a U.S. senator for Illinois.